July 29, 2024
Since November last year, Willem Mulderij has been manager of UC Group Engineering, the team that deals with logistics (data) analyses and design assignments, among other things.
Who is Willem and what were his motives for stepping into this role? He tells his story on the basis of six questions.
Willem Mulderij is a well-known name in Dutch logistics. For years he had his own project management and consultancy firm and supported companies such as Haribo, Dr. Oetker, Prénatal and Perry Sport. He led projects in the areas of outsourcing, new-build DCs and fit-out, package selections and all kinds of optimisation issues. Clients value him for his logistics expertise but also for his drive, honesty and people focus. Last year he made the switch to UC Group to lead a group of Young Professionals and to realise a number of ambitious growth plans together with them. Time for an interview.
“I come from a real family of entrepreneurs. My father had a contracting business and our whole yard was full of activity and building materials. Private and business life merging completely, as they did at home, was not something I wanted to continue, but ‘standing on your own two feet’ was instilled in me from an early age. After secondary school I went to the HEAO in Arnhem to study Distribution. What appealed to me was the dynamism and the combination of logistics, commerce, IT and financial aspects. I have been able to use that all my life and it still does not bore me.”
“My most important training ground was my first job at Lekkerland. I was hired as logistics manager but, apart from an outdated warehouse, there was virtually nothing yet in terms of logistics control. No planning process, no IT systems, nothing. I was able to build all of that up there from scratch, together with a number of driven colleagues. For example, we developed an ERP and WMS in-house. We were actually already doing the step-by-step implementation and improvement according to the Agile method back then, with sprints of sorts of three weeks each, without it having that name.”
“My second job, at Kees Becker, was also very instructive. Alongside a WMS implementation I also learned that the ‘contract logistics’ sector really is a different process from what you do as a shipper. Being dependent on your clients' volumes, not being able to be the conductor of your own supply chain: in my view that makes the logistics of service providers incredibly challenging.”
“In 2000 I decided to start as a freelancer in order to put the knowledge and experience I had gained to work for other companies. My market was, in short, the (enormous) gap that existed between the board and the shop floor. Boards made business plans, managers were busy with KPIs and dashboards and operations were busy with the daily business. Bringing those worlds together is what I have always regarded as my biggest challenge. In my view, unity within a company is crucial to being able to perform well. You cannot record everything down to the last % in processes and systems; it remains people work. Whether you are prepared to go for it all together: that determines whether you are successful or not.”
“I knew UC Group from my time in consultancy, when I regularly made use of their specific expertise and interim capacity. When I was approached by Pascal and Wilbert for the role of leader of their Young Professionals team, it appealed to me immediately. It is an incredibly nice group, with young, talented people who make an important contribution to the company. They produce data analyses and design studies for our senior partners in the partnership, but also carry out projects independently, such as optimisations. Being able to guide young people and pass on my experience is something I see as a fantastic next step in my career. It is also inspiring to experience how this generation of logisticians looks at the world.”
“We have mapped out an ambitious growth path and are working hard on our ‘engineer toolbox’. We use it in our services to standardise the approach and deliver quality. One example of such a tool is the Activity Based Costing model. With it we make an integral cost price calculation for a company and make clear how these costs can be allocated to a specific service/process. This is often the basis for many improvement or automation projects, because it has to show whether such an investment will lead to a real return. Another goal for me as manager is to optimise the interaction with the rest of UC Group. The partners have a wealth of experience from which we, as a group of young people, can learn a lot. Conversely, they can make even more use of the Young Professionals (with toolbox!) in their projects. I have now been on board for just under a year and I can see that this interaction is already growing considerably.”
“One piece of advice I give is to listen carefully and ask follow-up questions. Consultants sometimes have a tendency to want to show off their knowledge to clients as quickly as possible. Logistics is a profession of taking data-driven decisions and getting people to work together in order to optimise processes, but you do first have to understand what is going on in a company. Why is this company asking you for advice? Quite often it is different from the reason given at the first meeting. To find that out, you have to ask open questions and keep asking. That is how you demonstrate your craftsmanship. You first have to get a problem completely clear before you can offer even the beginning of a solution.
UC Group works everywhere: our professionals are based across the Benelux. We welcome visitors at our offices in Rotterdam and Nieuwkuijk. Drop by for a coffee and get to know us!
